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Invasive trash-eating jackals save Europe €2 million a year

By Barbara Axt

Lunch at the garbage dump

Janez Tarman

Golden jackals are often seen as a pest, blamed for the death of livestock and wild animals as they move from south-central Eurasia into northern Europe. But they are in fact saving countries millions of euros in waste management services.

“We want to change people’s opinions about jackals,” says Duško Ćirović at the University of Belgrade, Serbia. “They are blamed for hunting wild and domestic animals, but we found that they are only eating the carcasses and remains left by people.”

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Ćirović and his colleagues analysed the stomach contents of 606 golden jackals (Canis aureus) in different areas of Serbia that had been shot or killed on roads.

They found that most of the jackals’ diet was made up of the skin or intestines of domestic animals, such as pigs, or wild animals, like roe deer or wild boar, that are usually discarded by hunters or after the animals are slaughtered. They also ate small rodents that are often considered to be crop pests.

Considering the jackal population in Serbia, the researchers estimate that every year they remove 3700 tonnes of discarded animal remains and 13.2 million crop pest rodents, a service that would cost half a million euros a year.

Super savings

Based on the estimated jackal population in the whole of Europe, the figures could be as high as 13,000 tonnes of animal remains and 158 million rodents, they claim.

Medium-sized carnivores, like coyotes, foxes, badgers and jackals, usually thrive in urban areas, but are rarely appreciated for their ecological role or the ecosystem services they provide, the researchers say.
“They are particularly important in areas where there are no more apex predators – lions, bears, crocodiles – or obligate scavengers, like vultures,” says James Beasley at the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, University of Georgia. “They provide a valuable ecosystem service by removing dead animal material and potentially limiting disease transmission.”

However, he points out that they are also predators and a reservoir of diseases, including rabies. So the benefits of their presence could be outweighed if their population becomes too large.